American Savings Bank took a giant step forward five years ago when it doubled its size overnight by acquiring Bank of America's Hawaii branches. American Savings
relied on training to adjust
after buying new branches
By Dave Segal
dsegal@starbulletin.comBut Connie Lau, American Savings Bank's president and chief executive officer, said the bank has been able to adjust to its new size and adapt to the changing global economy by making a commitment to high-technology and retraining people instead of bringing in more experienced workers.
"It's people who make things happen and that's really been a lot about what's going on at American Savings Bank," Lau said yesterday during the keynote talk at the Hawaii Society of Corporate Planners luncheon at the Hawaii Prince Hotel. "We've been rewriting job descriptions like crazy. Unless you're going to can your whole work force and find those people with the higher level of skills, you've got to make a commitment to transform your own work force."
That's exactly what American Savings Bank, a subsidiary of Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc., did when it doubled its accounts to 6,000 from 3,000 and increased its assets to $5.5 billion from $3.7 billion upon acquiring Bank of America's Hawaii assets in December 1997.
Lau, who was promoted to the bank's top post from chief operating officer in June 2001, said the bank made two commitments after the acquisition. One was to double its capital expenditures and move most of that money into a state-of-the-art technological infrastructure. The other was to retrain its employees, which now number 1,400, rather than lay them off and bring in more experienced help.
"We made the commitment that we would take everybody who wanted to come along," Lau said. "That kind of defies logic and I wouldn't do it if I was on the mainland because what you learn in business school is that if you're going to transform an organization, you've got to bring in a team that knows how to transform the organization.
"In Hawaii it doesn't work because when we lay off people, we create a social problem because our community is so small."
Lau said that the bank's move to improve its technology was important because the bank now processes about 8 million items monthly, such as checks. It also has topped more than $1 billion in loans for the past two years.
"We've made a huge commitment to technology," Lau said. "Technology is transforming most of our businesses and increasing the productivity levels throughout the United States, and that's especially true in financial services."
American Savings Bank
Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc.
